Tartarus Sunspot
The Tartarus Sunspot is a sunspot that rotates in Earth's direction every few thousand years. History Early History At some unknown point in Earth's history, a race of super-ancient beings discovered the Tartarus Sunspot, and through their research learned that roughly every 4,000 to 4,500 years it would align with the Earth, causing the polar ice caps to melt and cause sea levels to rise. In response, the Super-Ancients constructed a Golden Capstone with a crystal peak which could absorb the excess heat, keeping global temperatures the same. They were somehow also able to make it that should a ritual of power be performed, then the people who had the dirt of their homeland deposited beneath the Capstone during the Rotation event would receive 1,000 years of absolute power. The Super-Ancients knew that even after they were gone from the Earth (by extinction, or otherwise departing the planet), there may yet be intelligent life, and decided to make the use of the Capstone to absorb the energy of the sunspot the first of five trials, which would allow them to determine if a new sentient species had arisen and were worthy of existing. After the Super-Ancients were gone, the Tartarus Sunspot continued to afflict the Earth every few thousand years, with polar ice caps melting and causing sea levels to rise with each rotation. However, a few years prior to 2570 BC, the Old Kingdom of Egypt were able to find and figure out how to use the Capstone to avert the Tartarus Rotation. They began constructing a pyramid and left the uppermost part unfinished so that the Golden Capstone could be set in place. A few years after the Great Pyramid was completed, the next Tartarus Rotation occurred, but thanks to the Capstone, the rise in temperatures and major flooding that had besieged Earth for several of its previous rotations were prevented. For reasons unknown, perhaps knowing that it was not the true time for the First Trial to be completed, the Egyptians then disassembled the Capstone into seven Pieces. Over the next few centuries, the Pieces were hidden in places related to the seven wonders of the ancient world. Before Seven Ancient Wonders Over the years leading up to the late 20th century, astronomers would theorise and later confirm the existence of the Tartarus sunspot, which would earn its name after the hellish landscape of Greek mythology. Some time before the 1990's, Max Epper was distracted from his research in the ancient Machine linked to the Dark Star when he made the connection between the ancient floodings and the rotation of the sun's Tartarus sunspot. Having heard of the Capstone during his studies as an archaeologist, Epper was able to deduce that the Golden Capstone of the Great Pyramid had the peculiar ability to avert the dangers the sunspot posed to Earth. Knowing that it had long been lost to history, Epper began making preparations to help organise a joint multi-national mission to locate the ancient wonders of the world and the Capstone pieces they contained. By the early 1990's, both the Catholic Church (as agents of the Kingdom of Land) and the Commander-in-Chief's In Extremis Force (funded by the Caldwell Group which served the Kingdom of Sea) began making their own preparations to seize the power offered through the power of Tartarus by beggining their own research into the wonders. After locating the Callimachus text which revealed the resting places of the long-missing wonders, Epper and Jack West Jr sought an Oracle of Siwa to translate the Word of Thoth the text was written in. With the latest Oracle having recently died, they sought his pregnant wife to ask permission to use the child's ability when they grew up. However, Francisco del Piero and his faction kidnapped Malena and took her first-born son to translate their own copy of the Callimachus text, while Jack and Epper were fortunate enough to be able to retrieve a second child, a girl, from Malena's dead body. With a race to claim the Capstone pieces and choose the ritual which would suppress the Tartarus sunspot's heat on its next alignment, Epper called in the friends he had made in several small nations to inform them of his proposed mission, and during his presentation he shared his findings on the sunspot. Ultimately, Epper managed to convince the nations to unite in the mission, which for the next several years would require the guarding of Lily until she could translate the Callimachus text. Seven Ancient Wonders In the week leading up to the day of the Tartarus sunspot's next alignment with Earth on March 20th, the excess heat the sunspot gave off was at first barely noticeable with mild increases in temperature. However, as dawn began on the day of the Tartarus Rotation, it immediately became apparent that global temperatures were quickly rising, and the sunspot was quickly identified as the source of the problem. Once the CIEF claimed the last piece of the Capstone, Marshall Judah led them to the Great Pyramid to re-erect the Capstone and perform the ritual of power. Before the ritual began, the Coalition of Minnows team began fighting back, and during the conflict the Tartarus sunspot aligned perfectly with the Pyramid, causing a concentrated beam of the sunspot's energy to strike the Capstone. Judah's performance of the ritual of power was upset by Alexander escaping from the Capstone's recess before it was completed, but Mustapha Zaeed soon began performing the ritual with Lily as his sacrifice. As the ritual was completed, the Tartarus sunspot's energy was concentrated further through the Capstone's crystal array as it pierced Lily's heart, and thus Tartarus's excess heat was nullified and the ritual completed. With Jack having switched Zaeed's Saudi Arabian soil for Australian soil beforehand, the reward of 1,000 years of power for nullifying Tartarus was granted to Australia. After Seven Ancient Wonders During the autumnal equinox in 2007, members of the Japanese Blood Brotherhood went to Easter Island and, at the Great Pyramid beneath the island, they performed a ceremony which negated the power of Tartarus. Soon afterwards it was reported about the first Australian to be killed in action since Australia had inadvertently been given 1,000 years of power. Jack was perturbed by the article and wondered how Tartarus' power had been negated; it wasn't until months later after he had been captured by his father that Wolf explained how the Japanese performed a counter ceremony with a second Capstone. (The Six Sacred Stones) Years later, Cardinal Ricardo Mendoza explained to Jack how Tartarus and its rotation was the first of five tasks set by the super-ancient beings to test life on Earth. (The Four Legendary Kingdoms) Attributes Though most sunspots are temporary occurrences that last anywhere from a few days to a few months before decaying, and are typically cooler in temperature than the rest of the sun, the Tartarus sunspot is actually much hotter than a normal sunspot and has been around for at least several thousand years. Every time the Tartarus sunspot has aligned with Earth (roughly every 4,000 to 4,500 years), it has caused the planet's temperatures to rise above normal levels, leading to the melting of the polar ice caps and further-more causing sea-levels to rise. Trivia *The Tartarus Sunspot is named after the ancient Greek word for hell. Category:Seven Ancient Wonders Category:Solar phenomena